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ee a er ee Ee itt a a a i Mas A 2 i - 4 -- PORT PERRY STAR -- Tuesday, April 26, 1988 Editorial Comments Where are we going, Canada? What this country needs is a first class, bona-fide, na- tion-threatening crisis, something that will knock some sense into the 25 or so million people who inhabit this fair land known to the rest of the world as Canada. We're not talking about a crisis that can be sorted out over some negotiating table, or one that involves, language rights, or minority rights or constitutional rights, or any of the Other "rights" that dominate the landscape in Canada these ays. We mean something that really poses a threat to our well being as individudals and as a country. "We need something to start pulling this country togeth- er, something that will unite the people of this country and force them to stop the petty, narrow-minded self-interest squabbling and bickering that has caused Canada to split into a thousand little factions all running in different direc- tions. ' If we don't soon come to our senses, this country is go- ing to fly apart at the seams, reduced not just to ten provinc- es all clamouring for their own best interests, but a sad- sack collection of groups stepping on each other's toes in a wild "me first" scramble to make sure nobody else gets any kind of small advantage. When was the last time Canada faced any kind of real "crisis? Nearly half a century ago during the World War. In the past forty years, our "crises" have all been man-made internal ones, which really, by comparison, were nothing more than tiny little brush fires that could and should have been stomped out with ease. Instead, in our own way, a way that has become all too popular, even fashionable in this country, we have faced those brush fires not with deter- mination to put them out, but by constantly dousing them with of gasoline. The result is that they continue to burn away, and when" you add those thousand little brush fires together, they be- come one large fire that saps the energy of this nation, turns people against people, groups against groups, re- gions against regions, provinces against provinces, and eventually that nation against itself. We have reached the point where the nation is being devoured from within, and most of us are too proud, too stu- pid, too arrogant or too blind to admit it. : Suggesting that we need a full=blown crisis from out- side is of course over-stating things to press a point. What we need is to stop for a minute, step back, and take a long hard look at the course this country has been on for the last few decades, where we are now and where we are going. There is no external threat to Canada. We are our own worst enemy, and we are slowly but surely chipping away at the very foundations of our nation. All of us need to give our collective heads a shake be- fore it is too late. Port Perry (= A STAR , 3 235 QUEEN STREET - PORT PERRY, ONTARIO Phone 985-7383 P.0.Box90 LOB 1NO J. PETER HVIDSTEN Publisher Advertising Manager Member of the Canadian Community Newspaper Association and Ontario Community Newspaper Association. Published every Tuesday by the Port Perry Star Co. Ltd., Port Perry, Ontario. J.B. McCLELLAND Editor LL ; Authorized as second class mail by the Post Office Department, Ottawa, and for cash CATHY OLLIFFE payment of postage in cash. News & Features Second Class Mail Registration Number 0265 PAu AO AN COMMU 8 » " Gon od Subscription Rate: In Canada $20.00 per year. 2240100 ass0llhN Elsewhere $60.00 per year: Single Copy 50° © COPYRIGHT -- All layout and composition of advertisements produced by the adver- tisinig department of the Port Perry Star Company Limited are protected under copyright and may not be reproduced without the written permission of the publisher. COFFEE, TEA, OR A PIECE OF THE ACTION ? Chatterbox by Cathy Olliffe THE TROUBLE WITH LABELS Labels. Where would we be without them? If you don't think labels are necessary in this day and age, try taking the labels off all the tinned goods in your pantry. Then try making a pineapple dessert, not knowing if the tin you are opening is pineapple, tomato soup, tuna- fish or dog food. What would happen to a hockey team if they weren't labelled with sweaters and numbers? What about all the little pills you get at the drugstore? You'd have a heckuva time figur- ing out if you were taking your blood pressure or your birth control pills if it weren't for labels. Taking this thought one step further--have you ever turned a TV talk show on halfway through and wondered who was doing all the yakking? Thank goodness for those graphic labels at the bottom of your television screen, that describe who the guy is (like, Sarah Snout, pig expert). Those graphic labels are important-- otherwise, you sometimes wouldn't have a clue who you were listening to. Taking the thought even further--how about the importance of names as labels? . Absolutely everyone on God's green earth has a name (not to mention a number) and | can't even imagine what would become of a person who didn't have a name. The type of name you have also determines what kind of person you are--research has proven this. If you, for example, were given a name like Zowie, chances are you'll be a little "different", probably more creative than the other kids in your class. If your given name is John or Robert, chances are you'll do better in ihe business world than someone named Sky ue. We are surrounded oy labels in this society. Good labels, bad labels--they exist merely to sort out and make sense of the barrage of in- formation we deal with on a daily basis. And basically, mankind loves the label. We love knowing what's what at all times, what's being packed in all those cardboard boxes when we're moving, what's in those an- cient filing cabinets in the office basement. We put labels on meat in the freezer, on the front of our notebooks, on recipe cards--look anywhere in the room you're sitting in, right now, and try and tell me you don't see at least one label. And along with loving labels on things, peo- ple themselves like to be labelled. As long as the labels are good. We like to be labelled as Rich, Nice, Pleas- ant, Generous, God-fearing, Loveable, Good- looking and such. On the other hand, we don't like being la- belled as Poverty-stricken, Mean, Cheap, Hateful, Ugly, Stupid, Boring etc. Call us Slim and we'll kiss 'ya. Call us Fat and we'll slug 'ya. ~ We seem to have a real preoccupation with labels these days. In all types of media, we read of the discrimination caused by labelling, and how, as a society, we resent the labels thrust upon us. Unfortunately, these labels are sometimes necessary. If you're writing about the starving children in Ethiopia, for example, it's pretty dif- ficult to get your point across without using the labels Poor, Destitute, Skinny, Diseased, Homeless and Dying. It's equally tough to write about the heroics of Rick Hansen without mentioning that he's a paraplegic in a wheelchair. Granted, Paraplegic isn't a particularly posi- tive label, but it is important in any story about Rick Hansen. A while ago, the Port Perry Star took a fair bit of heat over a photograph | took of three students at R.H. Cornish Public School. In the cutline underneath this photo, | described the three students as being members of the "TMR" class, meaning "Trainable Mentally Re- tarded." | could have taken a photo of any of the stu- dents at Cornish, but a teacher in charged specifically asked me to feature this class. While | was taking the picture, the teachers continuously referred to this class as the TMR class. Naturally, when it came time for me to write the cutline, | mentioned what class the three students belonged to, just as | would mention the grade of any student. | mean, you have to believe people sometimes, and if a teacher called the class TMR, then | have to believe them, right? Well, talk about a lot of fuss when the paper hit the stands. We had phone calls and even a letter taking us to task for "labelling" the three students in question. And while | was angry about the situation, | have to agree that | was, in fact, labelling the students by mentioning what class they be- long to. However, if they had been members of the Grade Five class I'm sure | wouldn't have heard a peep about labelling. (Turn to page 11) 4 SSH PH